


Better It Be You

by cricket_aria



Category: Naruto
Genre: Civilian!Sakura, F/M, disapproving Tsunade, inappropriate wedding gifts, marrying to avoid an arranged marriage to someone else, mid time-gap
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:15:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25538635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cricket_aria/pseuds/cricket_aria
Summary: When Sakura's parents realize that she would be ill-trained for any job in the civilian world should she ever be too badly injured to remain a ninja they decide to try to arrange a marriage for her with one of the members of a major clan, so that at least if that day comes she'll still have value within the ninja community.  Too bad they didn't discuss it with her first.
Relationships: Haruno Sakura/Hatake Kakashi
Comments: 19
Kudos: 213
Collections: Just Married Exchange 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [effpeeks](https://archiveofourown.org/users/effpeeks/gifts).



“Didn’t I tell you that you should emancipate yourself from your parents?” Tsunade asked the moment Sakura pushed open her door, not even waiting for a greeting.

When Sakura had suddenly been called to the Hokage’s office she’d been expecting either a new lesson or a new mission, not a sudden reiteration of an old argument. “I haven’t forgotten how you feel,” she offered diplomatically as she shut the door behind her, “but my own feelings about it haven’t changed, Shishou. They’ve never tried to take my earnings or forbid me from any missions, so I don’t see why I should hurt them like that.”

Every child who passed the academy had the right to petition for emancipation, a right primarily offered for the sake of ninja just like Sakura who had come from civilian families. Civilians rarely really expected their children would successfully graduate from the academy, or, if they did, that they would ever move beyond being the lowest-level of genin. Instead they were sent there because, even if they flunked out without graduating, attending would still allow them to make connections that would open up paths later in life which would remain closed to anyone who only went to civilian schools. If their children actually not only beat the odds and passed, but then showed themselves skilled enough to continue advancing—as the Chuunin vest still stiff with newness that Sakura was wearing proved her to be to anyone who might have doubted that even after Tsunade accepted her as an apprentice—often they would start causing trouble over the increasing level of danger. Emancipation removed their feelings from the equation.

But, even if Sakura had been willing to alienate her family like that, by all accounts the whole process was long and frustrating. While the village _wanted_ to smooth things out for any civilian-born ninja who needed it, they also didn’t want to make it easy for any children born out of one of the ninja families to extract themselves from their clan without a very strong case that they had need to. Their first step in doing that was wrapping anyone seeking emancipation up in so many layers of bureaucratic red tape that nobody would take the time to pick their way back out of it without a real reason to. From there things became fairly straight-forward for anyone seeking to extract themselves from a civilian family, no need to go through the hell of their family arguing out exactly what information they knew that needed to be sealed within them as clan secrets and no risk of the decision the family reached wiping out access to so much of their childhood that they ended up mentally incapable of even using their new freedom if they got it, but those early stages alone sounded like so much of a hassle that Sakura didn’t see the point. Not when her family wasn’t doing anything to try to hold back her career. 

Tsunade sighed and nudged a piece of paper across the table towards Sakura. “I’m not one to say I told you so,” she said, as Sakura saw her own photo neatly centered at the top of the sheet, a block of writing starting with ‘Seeking marriage offers for…’ directly below, “but I have a feeling you might want to change your mind,”

* * *

“Just what is _this_?” Sakura asked as she burst into her family home and slammed the notice down on the coffee table in front of where her parents were sitting.

They didn’t even have the grace to look ashamed, her mother just smiling like they’d been caught out in a surprise and saying, “We should have realized that we couldn’t hide it from you when you’re working with the Hokage, though we’d hoped to let you know when you had a few options to choose between!”

“’A few options?’” Sakura repeated dully, eyes darting between the two of them. “Do you actually realize what you’ve signed me up for?”

The arranged marriage application system was supposed to be a way for ninja from civilian or low-level families to improve their standing in the village. If they didn’t care about marrying for love they could put out an official notice seeking a spouse from among the major clans. Even if it was very unlikely that they’d attract more than a cousin or other member well removed from a family's main branch, once the marriage was settled then they and any children born from the union would have the right to begin learning the clan’s secret techniques. How useful this was depended on the clan in question--there was little the Aburame could teach to an outsider spouse, for instance, since there was only a narrow window of time after birth when a body could safely be convinced to play host to their insects--but in most cases it was an easy way for someone from a no-name family to gain a stronger position in the village.

It was also a way, though Sakura had never realized it until Tsunade had made it clear that what her parents were doing was perfectly legal within village law, for families who didn’t believe they had enough clout to offer their gifted children to find another that did. It _was_ considered to be in rather poor form, but they did have the rights to do it on their child’s behalf. So far as village law was concerned Sakura had vetoed her right to refuse by choosing to remain under their power.

“Now Sakura,” her father said in the same tone he’d used when she was a small child and he was trying to convince her that vegetables needed to be eaten, or shots needed to be accepted, “We know that at your age this might seem like the most terrible thing we could do to you, but have you ever considered what will happen if you’re ever too badly injured to continue being a ninja?”

“ _We’d_ never thought about it, not until poor Keiko came home after losing her leg,” her mother added earnestly. “Sweetie, that poor girl needs to try to restart her entire life with no skills that are useful for a regular job, too old to just transfer into a civilian secondary school and move on from there like you would if you’d just been unable to graduate the Academy. If you were the wife to a member of one of the clans at least you’d still have _worth_ to them, instead of just being thrown aside.” 

“You would at least think they could have found a desk job for her somewhere,” her father added lowly, “instead of forcing her to find a new path all alone.”

They had _tried_ , Sakura knew and could not say without giving away confidential information. She had been there for the surgery, been there as Tsunade had presented every option to the young woman that she could think of to let her continue making a living when it became clear she couldn’t go on as a ninja. It had been Keiko’s own choice to turn them all down and return to her parents. She’d said that it would be too painful to watch from behind a desk whenever her teammates came through between missions, unable to help them with anything more than doing their paperwork. To her returning to civilian life was the kinder choice.

Even then they had not _thrown her aside_. Shizune visited three times a week to teach her enough about medication to find a job beneath a pharmacist, and she had a list of other civilian jobs Tsunade had found people to train her in if she decided that wasn’t for her. But all of that information was Keiko’s alone to share, Sakura wouldn’t spill any knowledge about her choices even if it meant allowing her parents to live on with their terrible misunderstanding.

“I’m the Hokage’s apprentice,” she said instead, “no one is going to throw me aside.”

“I’m sure Keiko thought that a month ago,” her father replied in a tone that brokered no argument.

“One of Ino’s cousins has already expressed an interest,” her mother chipped in. “Didn’t you always used say you wished that the two of you could be family? If you married him, you could be!”

* * *

The argument went in circles from there, her parents so sure that they knew what was right for her that they refused to bend. The only concession they had offered was that they would allow her to choose which of the men who offered for her hand that she would accept. Even that was made with the warning that it would only remain true as long as she was a chuunin. If she rose to jonin, and the danger she was in during missions rose with her, they would take the choice out of her hands.

She could either stagnate until she was eighteen to avoid having an unwanted marriage thrust upon her, choose someone of her own and pile on the birth control until she could divorce them at eighteen, or take Tsunade’s advice and try to apply for emancipation with this hanging over her head. The only issue with that was that the process could take over a year, and if her parents decided that if she wasn’t going to play fair by their agreement than they didn’t need to either they could have her married off long before then. She honestly didn't know whether that would be their reaction or not; she never would have imagined them taking this path the begin with, and knowing that they fully believed it was the only form of protection they could offer her if injury ever ended her career left her unsure of how to read them. What would they be willing to do to her in the name of love?

Sunset found her sitting on the roof of the Hokage residence with her legs curled to her chest, still trying to think of an answer that didn’t involve jumping down and begging Tsunade to grossly misuse her powers in anyway that she could to extract Sakura from the issue. She was pretty sure that Tsunade would do it. She was also pretty sure that after doing it Tsunade would release her from her apprenticeship, not interested in training someone who wouldn’t work harder to solve their own damn problems.

From nowhere another copy of the notice Tsunade had given her was suddenly dangled in front of her face. She looked up to see Kakashi leaning over her, his visible eye looking honestly bemused. “Sakura,” he said, wiggling the notice in front of her nose, “could you tell me why I woke up this morning to mail trying to sell me on one of my cute students as a potential wife?”

“They even sent one to _you_?” she asked, then buried her face in her knees and mumbled, “Could this get any more embarrassing?” For the first time ever she was actually glad that Sasuke and Naruto had left her behind, so at least neither of them could have gotten one. The look on Sasuke’s face _alone_ would have been something she’d never have been able to recover from.

“From the number of people who stopped me to ask about it while I searched for you, I suspect every eligible ninja in the village got one. That is how this usually works,” he said bluntly, then shifted into mock-mournful as he plopped down beside her, “And there I was feeling special.”

“Oh god,” she said, as she fully realized with dawning horror just how far it must have spread. Somehow she had thought that sending them out would stay within Tsunade’s control, that while her position meant that she had to distribute them they could at least send them out slowly and carefully choose men who would have discretion about the whole thing. She hadn’t questioned Tsunade long enough before running off to confront her parents to realize that once the notice was ordered they would all go out just like that. “ _Oh god_ , Lee is going to propose to me. Lee is going to propose to me, and then be _so hurt_ when I say no after it looks like I put myself out to the entire town. And Ino, she will _never_ let me live this down. Every time she’s complaining about a bad date she’ll finish it up by going ‘But at least I’m not as desperate as Sakura, throwing myself at anyone who might have me!’”

His hand settled heavily onto the top of her head, and she suspected that if she lifted her head to check she’d see his eye crinkled into his attempt at a comforting smile as he said, “Cheer up, Sakura. It’s not like this is the worst thing that could happen.”

She knew it was true. In fact, the first several months of her genin career had been a nearly unending stream of worse things happening before they finally settled down after the shattering of her team. But none of that, not even Sasuke’s final actions towards her as he defected, had felt like such a personal humiliation. And it would go on for at _least_ a year, unless…

She whipped around suddenly and caught Kakashi’s arm in a fierce grip, exclaiming, “Marry me, sensei!” Kakashi made a choked noise in his throat but she ignored it, grabbing his copy of the notice and turning it over to reveal a seal drawn on its back that she recognized from contracts she'd seen passing over Tsunade's desk, “This will destroy all the copies besides yours, my parents', and the one filed in the Hokage's office once it's accepted and the finalized, won’t it? We could go right down to Tsunade and do it now.”

“Sakura, even if you just want to make this all go away, there are better choices,” he said weakly.

“Really? Are you going to try to force me to have as many kids as I can before I turn eighteen and can divorce you without risking my parents doing this whole thing all over again?” she asked. She didn’t even need to wait for an answer, his horrified look already enough of one. “You’re the only man I can really trust wouldn’t try to take advantage like that, Sensei.”

That was a little unfair to her friends, she realized, but remained true because anyone else she could say that about either couldn’t take her up on it, because they were heirs to their family and wouldn’t be allowed to get married to someone just to help them dodge marriage to someone else, or _wouldn’t_ , because they were Neji and she couldn’t even imagine how that conversation would go besides poorly. The only other option was Lee, and she wasn’t cruel enough to ask him to marry her just so she could divorce him in four years time.

Kakashi wouldn’t misunderstand what she needed from him, wouldn’t feel used or hurt when she left him, and had never shown any signs of interest in a love affair with anything but his books for her to be getting in the way. He was the perfect choice.

“Just four years, Kakashi,” she said softly, “it’s not that long.”

He stared down at her, searching her face for a long moment, before finally ruffling her hair affectionately, “How could I turn down one of my cute students when they’re in a tight spot?”

For the first time since seeing the notice the tight panicky feeling in Sakura’s mind finally eased up. If someone had told her when she’d woken up that day that she’d end it wanting nothing so much as for Kakashi to agree to marry her she would have recommended a psychiatric evaluation, but now that it had happened she could feel nothing but glad and grateful. 

Marriage to Kakashi.

It wasn’t the worst thing that could happen.


	2. Chapter 2

Tsunade didn’t seem nearly as enthused about the idea when Sakura dragged Kakashi down to her doorstep to get it done. Indeed, she had Kakashi against the wall by his throat as soon as Sakura finished asking her to marry them. Only the fact that his feet remained planted on the floor suggested that she was still open to hearing them out as she growled, “ _Kakashi_. If I hear that you’ve taken advantage of any of your students…”

“To be fair,” he choked out, voice rough from the pressure on his windpipe, “she was the one who proposed to me.” Sakura wondered if he realized that the expression of wounded innocence he wore did him little good in spite of being fully earned, not when it was the same look he wore when making endless excuses for his tardiness.

Forget touching her improperly, Sakura thought, he hadn’t even touched her as much as he _should_ have as her teacher. If he’d sparred with her properly, taught her properly, maybe she wouldn’t have sought Tsunade out. Though she wasn’t actually sure if that was a change she would want; even if he’d trained her as well as he possibly could she would never have grasped the strength that she was slowly coming to master without Tsunade, or know how to begin the slow process of storing up her chakra.

“I _was_ the one who asked him,” she admitted, then when Tsunade turned a sharp-eyed glare to her modified it to, “Begged him even, really Shishou, he hasn’t done anything wrong. Can you think of a faster way to make this all go away than getting married for a few years? My parents already gave permission by putting out that ridiculous notice, you can marry us right now and have it done with.”

Tsunade finally let go of Kakashi, and just stepped back to frown at them both. “Do you two fully understand what you’re getting into here? This will need to be a _real_ marriage for the contract your parents offered to be fulfilled, Sakura, it's written straight into the betrothal conditions so that anyone who accepts knows they won’t be used for their clan by someone who will begin ignoring them the moment their vows are read. While thankfully no requirements are made about children, or else I’d be making sure that Kakashi could no longer _have them_ for agreeing to that, fidelity is written into it.”

Kakashi swept a hand through the air in a motion waving the matter away, which Sakura assumed meant she’d guessed rightly about his lack of romantic prospects, but she was the one Tsunade’s eyes were steadily fixed on. She smiled and shrugged, trying to make her master believe that she really had no reason to be concerned. “So I won’t be able to date for a few years, that’s fine. Really, Shishou, how many dates have you heard about me going on?” She tried on a teasing smile, leaning closer to her, “I thought you planned to keep me so busy with training that I wouldn’t have time for anything like that.”

Instead of softening Tsunade’s frown only grew deeper, and she pressed her palm to her forehead. “You’re fourteen-years-old, Sakura. You can say that now, but how happy will you be when you have to watch all your friends go through their teenaged loves while you two are in a marriage of… whatever you feel like calling this? And do we need to have another lesson about what hormones will be doing to you over the next few years? You might hate not being able to go out with anyone more than you’re imagining.”

Sakura could tell that Tsunade was trying to embarrass her into backing off more than anything else with that comment, and refused to let it get to her. “I think my husband will be the only one who needs to worry about my teenaged hormones,” Sakura said primly, then was surprised at just how much Kakashi could sound like he’d suddenly choked on something even though his mouth was empty.

“Then just one more thing to consider, Sakura,” Tsunade said, stepping close enough to stare intimidatingly down at her, “As his next of kin you’ll be the one I’ll be giving hell to about dragging this idiot into the hospital when he tries to avoid treatment for injuries. Do you really want to deal with that?”

“…You already do that, Shishou,” Sakura reminded her. Well, it was currently more of a 50/50 split between sending her or asking Gai to drag him in depending on how annoyed Tsunade was feeling at the time, but if in the future it was always on her it would hardly be a massive change. “Anyway, you’re just giving me another reason to learn from you as fast as I can so there won’t be many things I can’t just treat myself.”

Kakashi himself started to look like he was wavering a little at the prospect of his own personal doctor pestering him, but luckily it was at that moment that Tsunade finally threw up her hands and said, “Fine!” then pointed at Kakashi and said, “Do you take this young girl as your wife in the full knowledge that you will have me to answer to if I ever get the slightest hint that you’re taking advantage of the situation to make her do things she wouldn’t otherwise be willing to?”

“I wouldn’t put it quite like that,” he said weakly, but when her glare grew fiercer quickly said, “Yes, yes I do, with no alternative motives.”

“And do you,” she said, a little more softly, as she turned to Sakura, “agree to be saddled with this idiot for the next four years of your life, and that if at any point during those years you feel like making this marriage less ‘in name only’ you will come to me and Shizune first so we can verify that you’re doing it fully of your own will?”

“ _Yes_ , I promise that if we ever decide we want a belated red-hot wedding night I’ll talk to you first,” Sakura said with an eyeroll, “Do you need to make this so hard on Kakashi? He really is just trying to help a comrade.”

Neither of them paid any attention to Kakashi muttering, “’Red-hot…’ What happened to the cute little girl who would turn into a tomato if Sasuke so much as put a hand on her shoulder?”

“Believe me, for being a twenty-eight-year-old who came to me asking to marry their fourteen-year-old former student, who also happens to be my own apprentice, I am showing _remarkable_ good-will, Sakura. If I didn’t know your circumstances, he would have gone through a wall.” Then she turned and begrudgingly clasped Kakashi’s arm, “For what it’s worth, I don’t really believe that you’re trying anything. But I hate that my student is in a situation where she thinks _this_ is the best solution.” Then she stepped back, grabbing up the notice that they’d left lying on a table and swept her hand at them, “Well, it’s your choice. Go ahead, kiss the bride, we’ll all sign off, and you will be lawfully wedded spouses for whatever good it does you.”

Sakura hoped Kakashi was glad to see that his cute little tomato did still exist somewhere inside of her, because she could feel her cheeks growing flaming at Tsunade’s words as she and Kakashi stared at each other. Then she firmly pulled herself together and said, “Please turn around, Shishou,” before closing her own eyes. “I promise I won’t peek. I’m not going to force you to reveal your face to me like this.”

There was a long moment of silence between the two of them, broken only by Tsunade snorting and saying “I _do_ already know what he looks like,” though Sakura could hear her honoring her wishes and turning.

Then Kakashi slowly stepped forward. Sakura braced herself at the feeling of one of his hands at her cheek, but then she frowned in confusion when the other took one of her own hands and she could feel him raise it to the fabric of his mask. “Sakura,” he said softly, the muscles in his face moving beneath her fingers at the word, his thumb brushing up over her eyelid urging it to open. When she did she could see up close the way his forehead was furrowing, but there was a certainty in his visible eye as he said, “I think my wife, of all people, deserves to at least know what I look like.”

She hadn’t felt any butterflies in her stomach at the prospect of kissing him, but somehow they instead all came rushing in as he curled her fingers beneath his at the edge of the mask and helped her tug it down. As the fabric fell down around his neck she giggled suddenly, and his face twisted into a mock-pout that she could actually _see_ from more than just reading his one-eyed expressions, and all at once the atmosphere between them relaxed for the first time since her sudden proposal.

“That bad?” he asked, with a hang-dog expression. “It’s not too late to change your mind if you want a more handsome husband, you know.”

She shook her head quickly against the palm still cupping her cheek. “Not bad, but,” she giggled again, unable to help it, “I don’t know why I never even realized… Sensei, that’s the silliest tan line I’ve ever seen!”

His joking pout grew larger and he sighed, “Insulted by my wife before we’ve even finalized the marriage, how cruel.” Then, before things could grow awkward between them again, he leaned in suddenly and pressed his mouth to hers.

In the few times in the past that she’d considered what his mouth must be like—only as part of wondering about his face in general she would have insisted if anyone had been able to read her mind about it—she’d guessed that surely his lips had to be rough from the fabric of his mask constantly rubbing against them. But they weren’t really, although she had nothing to compare them to she thought they felt perfectly soft against her own. The kiss was closed-mouthed and gentle, and while he didn’t linger it also wasn’t the hasty peck that was all he’d really needed to offer.

Sakura wondered, faintly, if he was trying to give her as good of a first kiss as he was able to offer. And though she’d thought nothing of Tsunade leaving her vows open for the possibility of one day wanting more from her marriage, had found it a little funny that her master had been willing to build in that unneeded concession if anything, suddenly she could think of nothing else but what it would be like to open her mouth beneath that chaste warmth, to press herself closer, to kiss him for real.

But she didn’t act on that thought, not even giving into the impulse to lean after the kiss when he drew back. It was an idea to turn over in her head, to consider whether she’d someday really want to pursue it further. It wasn’t one to act on in that moment, when he looked at her and saw a young girl who needed his help, the twelve-year-old that she’d been still hovering too close in his memory for him to fully recognize that she was growing into someone so much more.

Then after they’d both scribbled their signatures beneath Tsunade’s, officially notating that the arranged marriage request had been fulfilled, he pressed something into her hand and she looked down to see the bright orange cover of one of his books. “Well,” he said, mask back in place so she could only see the teasing glint in his eyes, “While I can’t offer you that red-hot wedding night, somewhere around page one hundred you’ll find a good one to make up for it.” He ruffled her hair fondly just once before turning to make his way to the door, “I’ll find you soon to go over whatever other messy official things we need to take care of, but I’m afraid I’ll leave explaining to your parents why my name just appeared in their copy of the contract to you, Sakura. Getting attacked by an angry father I can’t properly defend myself against without harming a civilian was not in my horoscope this morning!”

Or, Sakura revised the thoughts she’d just been having, maybe she would decided that an old pervert who thought that a used Icha Icha book was an appropriate wedding gift wasn’t worth growing any mushy feelings over.

Still, she couldn’t help smiling as she tucked the book safely away for later.


End file.
